House Dems: It’s totally unfair to have a debate question on the deficit commission Obama created and then ignored

posted at 10:01 am on August 15, 2012 by Ed Morrissey

Some Democratic lawmakers want to make sure that one question does not get asked at the upcoming first presidential debate – about Simpson-Bowles.

Three Democratic House members objected Tuesday to a request by four senators that President Barack Obama and Mitt Romney be asked which of the commission’s proposals to address the debt they support. The Democrats said such a question would force “candidates to choose solutions from one menu of options.” …

But that caused Reps. Mike Honda (D-Calif.), Jerry Nadler (D-N.Y.) and Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.) to cry foul, writing in their own letter to the debate commission on Tuesday that although the Simpson-Bowles commission’s plan “may contain proposals helpful to our recovery…to hold it out as the only pathway to fiscal responsibility and economic success is foolish and wrong.”

“We urge the [Debate] Commission to fight any effort to unnecessarily narrow such an important debate by placing disproportionate attention on one set of proposals over another,” they wrote, adding that such a question would “cheapen the debate” and “thwart the candidates’ ability to explain alternative proposals.”

On the face of it, this is a ridiculous assertion. Asking one question about the Simpson-Bowles plan doesn’t restrict a range of answers on budget reforms and deficits. The moderators can ask other questions on the topic, and the candidates themselves can expand on those options in their answers to the Simpson-Bowles question. Ryan will almost certainly do so, since he served on the commission and passed his own version of budgetary reform in the House — twice.

But of course, this isn’t about the range of options in the debate. Democrats don’t want Barack Obama to have to answer for his total rejection of the commission he called into existence in the first place. Obama announced his grand plan to find consensus on the deficits after taking a beating on the massive deficits his budgets ran up, a few months before the midterm elections. He wanted to gain traction against the rising Tea Party by taking away one of the key fiscal arguments. When that plan failed, Obama completely ignored the recommendations from Simpson-Bowles even though the panel was a presidential advisory commission.

Part of this effort by Democrats to bury that history has been a new effort to get Erskine Bowles to repudiate his remarks from September 2011 praising Ryan while criticizing Obama and his budget. So far, Bowles isn’t budging:

Erskine Bowles is not backing away from his previous praise of Rep. Paul Ryan now that the Wisconsin congressman is on the Republican presidential ticket.

“I like him,” Bowles, the former chief of staff to President Bill Clinton and co-chairperson of the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform, told The Daily Caller in a phone interview.

“I think he’s smart. I think he’s intellectually curious. I think he is honest, straightforward and sincere. And I think he does have a serious budget out there — it doesn’t mean I agree with it by any stretch of the imagination. But I’m not going to act like I don’t like him or that I don’t have some real respect for him.”

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Three Democratic House members objected Tuesday to a request by four senators that President Barack Obama and Mitt Romney be asked which of the commission’s proposals to address the debt they support. The Democrats said such a question would force “candidates to choose solutions from one menu of options.”

Like it’s against the rules for Obama or Bite Me to offer their own solutions in addition to the ones offered? The truth is they don’t wanna have to agree with ANYTHING that would involve cutting spending, whether it’s coming from Bowles-Simpson or from themselves.

And it’s asinine anyway since Romney and Ryan can easily bring it up on their own and likely will.

Maybe it’s time to kill the Presidential Debate Commission. It is just another organization that has been taken over by leftists who don’t represent the average American. Let the candidates hash out a debate format/schedule/moderator publicly between each other.

I find it ironic that the media only talks about the Ryan budget, but the presidents budgets have failed to get a single vote in the congress. 97-0, 414-0, 99-0, and the US senate has not proposed one in 4 years let alone passed.

hree Democratic House members objected Tuesday to a request by four senators that President Barack Obama and Mitt Romney be asked which of the commission’s proposals to address the debt they support. The Democrats said such a question would force “candidates to choose solutions from one menu of options.”

Harummph! Hear, hear! That would be like a moderator asking candidates to “raise your hand if you believe in global warming climate change.”

Its a mistake to institutionalize these debates. Remember O’Sullivans first rule: “All organizations that are not actually right wing will, over time, become left wing.”

These debates should be renegotiated every 4 years between the campaigns. If not, we will have to put up with Democrat manipulations and interferences, leftwing moderators and dysfunctional debate formats till the sun explodes.

The best and worst thing about these debates and this flimsy group of moderators, is that at any given time, on any given question about the debt trajectory or even a broad question about the economy, Romney can very easily mold this into his answer, and he’d be right in doing so.

We can debate why Obama’s presidency has been failure ad nauseum, I submit his greatest failure was not following through on Simpson- Bowles.

This was a perfect opportunity for him to pass a responsible bi-partisan plan that he could have touted as one of his greatest accomplishments, and he would have had a strong argument. As it is, our panderer in chief decided to ignore the commission and stay the unsustainable path hoping the bought and not yet paid for votes could carry him over the finish line.

The Simpson- Bowles gambit will be the leading cause of his demise, and Romney should take every opportunity to drive him the lost opportunity, moderators shmoderators. And I think he will.

House Dems: It’s totally unfair to have a debate question on the deficit commission Obama created and then ignored

Well that’s a big mistake…now if they are not asked, it gives an opening for Mitt to ask, during the debates, why not discuss this, is the panel bias? And then go on and make the moderator and Obama look foolish…

This forces the moderator to ask the question, or he/she will be labeled a shill (not that they aren’t but they hate those labels).

The debates in this campaign will be the most watched political media of this election cycle, do not let our enemies control the narrative, and liberal moderators are exactly that. When Obama and his liberals are screaming, the nation has a chance to win for a change.

When democrats win, America loses and the left can only win through dishonesty and manipulation.

Obama is going to invade Syria right about the time the debates are scheduled to occur. Look for cancellations from Obama as a result.

NotCoach on August 15, 2012 at 10:11 AM

Saw some articles earlier speculating about how Biden might find some excuse to duck his debate with Ryan. But recalling the Biden/Palin debate, I’m not sure he needs to. Biden said a lot of idiotic (and factually incorrect) stuff during that debate, and the MSM simply ignored it and declared him the winner (or said it was a draw).

Biden could probably sit through his debate with Ryan while drooling down his shirt and masturb*ting, and the MSM would announce the next morning that he clearly won the debate and ruled the stage.

The Democrats said such a question would force “candidates to choose solutions from one menu of options.” …

Okay, so let’s ask Obama which options he has implemented since becoming President and ask Romney which of the Obama-era measures he would continue. ;0 They could use the ensuing silence to sell more popcorn.

You know what guys? This is actually about fairness. It isn’t fair to torpedo Obama for his own actions. In a just America we handicap and rob the successful to make the unsuccessful equal. So in the spirit of fairness here is a list of things Romney can’t talk about during the debates.

Jobs/unemployment
Debt/deficit
The economy
Fast and Furious
Supreme Court nominations
Budgets
Regulation
National security
Foreign policy
Illegal appointments
Executive order abuse
ObamaTax/ObamaCare/Affordable Care Act
School records
Any and all political or private activities prior to January 21st, 2009

And as one last accommodation to fairness Romney must acknowledge that he is a racist and misogynist at the beginning of each debate. If we implement all of the above Obama should be able to compete on an equal basis.

The only thing that could improve on this revelation would be to have a nitwit talking head from CNN or MSNBC raise this issue while interviewing Gingrich. It would be like watching Samson wielding the jawbone of an a**.

A Romney first: over 40% of youth vote back him
August 15, 2012 | 9:19 am

For the first time since he began running for president, Republican Mitt Romney has the support of over 40 percent of America’s youth vote, a troubling sign for President Obama who built his 2008 victory with the overwhelming support of younger, idealistic voters.

Pollster John Zogby of JZ Analytics told Secrets Tuesday that Romney received 41 percent in his weekend poll of 1,117 likely voters, for the first time crossing the 40 percent mark. What’s more, he said that Romney is the only Republican of those who competed in the primaries to score so high among 18-29 year olds.

“This is the first time I am seeing Romney’s numbers this high among 18-29 year olds,” said Zogby. “This could be trouble for Obama who needs every young voter he can get.”

I would be shocked if Obama or Biden are asked any questions of substance. The liberal media will ask Romney about his taxes and Ryan wanting to take Medicare away from seniors. Obama will be asked about his strategy to kill Bin Laden.

Let’s acknowledge that any ‘debate moderators’ that the commission is going to come up with will be biased and then choose a balance of bias. A perfect debate duo would be George Stephie from the Clinton administration, and his equivalent in the administration of President George W. Bush, -Karl Rove.

Both members of the debate duo have to agree on every question. All questions are asked of both candidates.

Wow – so Bowles is an actual stand up guy that won’t agree to do a hostage video. Now if we can find five more I won’t be able to say ‘I can count on one hand how many principled Democrats I am aware of.’

Lieberman has come and gone and is now back, but he is technically an Independent now so he doesn’t count.

What budget proposal does Obama like? What budget proposal is Obama running on? He didn’t use anything from the Simpson-Bowles commission, a commission that he called for himself. His Senate majority leader, Harry Reid and the Senate Democrats, with a majority since Obama’s election, have not passed a budget in 3 years. Is this a serious approach to our economic problems? Obama has made budget proposals to congress, and they have been such a joke that his own Democrat party gave him zero votes in support. Is this a serious approach to our economic problems? Why should any questions about the history of the economic incompetence of Democrat politicians over the last four years be blocked or censored in the debates? The Democrats and Obama have done zero for our economy and should be punished severely at the polls. When Obama speaks publicly he should be heckled with “Where’s your budget?”, because he hasn’t produced even one budget after nearly four years in office.

..this is ANOTHER misstep by the stupid donks. The debates are NOT a trial. Just because they seek to limit the questions that can be asked, that does not mean that Romney or Ryan cannot “offer up anything not already in evidence”. And, by engaging in these histrionics, the Dems have tipped their hand.

One can just hear those aides over at Camp R&R furiously scribbling down debate notes.

So now they want to control the debate questions, as if the fact that all debates are being moderated by their flunkys in the slimestream media doesn’t give them enough control. It’s a whirlwind of Demsperation and pandermonium.

Had the Dooms been not so obstructionist and actually passed a budget in the past 1,205 days maybe the country wouldn’t be teetering on the edge of a cliff and instead of writing letters about the unfairness of debate questions on budget proposals, they could’ve actually directly addressed the debt.

And for heaven’s sake don’t ask how many times Obama has met with the jobs committee. Ridiculous that the Democrats are wanting to set the rules in their favor. Can’t play fair, have to cheat, like always. Bad enough having mostly liberal moderators. Betting on Romney and Ryan to win the debates easily. Hope they restrict Obama’s answers to 30 seconds, rather than to hear a campaign speech.

I love it… I’m hoping by forcing the talking points, the msm will also be forced to report it which will – I hope – bring some light to the general public that have been in the dark these past few years.

..also, you make an excellent point: consider, like the recent spike in gas prices, how the drought in the Midwest that destroyed the corn harvest and caused spike in Orville Redenbacher will raise the ire of the debate watchers.

The MF Dems already control the debates with the leftist hacks moderating them. Obama is afraid to have a real debate because he wouldn’t have the questions to study before the debate. We all know the debates are rigged for the POS in the white house.

The Democrats were wasting their time and taxpayer funded paper writing that letter.

All you have to do is look at who the moderators are–the very same biased,lberal, Obama cheerleading, pathetic excuses for journalists MSM flotsam.

Don’t count on Obama getting any hard or embarrassing questions. “Mr. President, just how long have you and the lovely, fashionable, vibrant Michelle been married?”

Do count on Romney getting zingers. “Governor Romney, can you tell us how many people your policies have killed while you were at that outsourcing, unemployment factory known as Bain Capital and how many people will be die as a result of your policies as President?”